Day 4, June 25th, 2019

This is so exhausting. Every interaction takes so much energy. I also feel so bad when I retire to my room, so once I am done writing this out I will go have my host mom check over my homework. At least it is something to talk about. I have been here long enough to have become a disappointment. At this point, my host mom will repeat phrases that I know I have heard before but can’t remember. There are just so many! Even though I am constantly writing down new words I can’t keep up. The old pointing-at-things-and-naming-them trick for showing progress has worn off. But tomorrow we are getting a verb list, so that should make my ability to construct full sentences better. Right now I think my two biggest areas for improvement/impediments are not knowing verbs and not being able to understand what Tajiks are saying to me. They use a more colloquial form of Tajiki than the one we are learning in the classroom with a lot more Russian loanwords as well. This further makes it difficult to always understand what people are saying to me.

            It’s only 9:17pm and I am already so tired I could fall asleep right now. Also the house ran out of water, so I have to use the squat toilet in the back and can’t shower or even wash my hands. I am really glad I brought a lot of wipes. Also, I wonder if this is my fault since I have been using a lot of water by showering every day, which it doesn't seem like Tajiks do. Either way, I feel bad. This has been such a long day. After class, we went to the botanical gardens, which was really just a larger park with a bunch of gazebos (we even passed two weddings). In the gardens, along the path, were pieces of exercise equipment next to jungle-gym style structures. I will upload photos if there is enough data. They were all brightly painted so at first glance they just looked like children’s play structures (and there certainly wasn’t anyone using them), but if you looked closely at them you could see metal labels in English with exercise equipment names and descriptions for who to use them just like you find on machines at the Y. This reminded me of a short essay someone read at an assembly a few months back about how around the Beijing Olympics the Chinese government put exercise machines in all these villages, but no one used them as exercise machines and instead they became social gathering places, if I recall correctly. This reminded me of that. The Chinese government also interestingly enough has a growing influence in Tajikistan too. As an employee from American Councils noted, America is only ahead in “soft power” with countries like China quickly becoming a place where Tajik students want to study and Chinese a very common language for students to learn. Only ten years ago Tajiks were very distrustful of the Chinese, starting crazy rumors about the Chinese workers sent to pave roads being convicts and such.

            All together the visit from the employee of American Councils was very interesting. I am going to try to summarize her main (and interesting) points about Tajikistan’s history, culture, and geopolitical role here.

On the economy

            The economy of Tajikistan is tied entirely to Russia. 10% of Tajiks of working age live (and work) in Russia. These are mainly young men. Russia’s economy is tied mostly to oil, so when oil's value falls, so does the Tajik economy.

On marriage

            In Tajikistan, women outnumber men due to the high number of men working in Russia (about 10%). Mothers actually play a larger role in why people marry so young. Until their sons marry, mothers (wives) are the lowest member of the family and have to do all the cooking, cleaning, and other household tasks. Once a son marries, his new wife moves in and becomes the new lowest member of the family. A lot of the work now falls on her. After years of basically being a servant, the mother can put her feet up for a bit. Virginity is highly valued which explains why child/teen marriage rates are high. Mothers also like younger brides for their sons because they are more docile and more likely to do what their new mother-in-law tells them. In this way, they perpetuate these cycles.

On the soviet times

            During the time of the Soviet Union, the USSR leveled the playing field in main ways. For some countries, this meant a drastic decrease in the quality of life, but for Tajikistan this meant a lot of development work. Most Tajiks looked back fondly on the USSR and comment on how they would like to go back. In a referendum/vote prior to the fall, something around 94 or 96% percent of Tajiks voted to stay, while it was the opposite of in some places in Eastern Europe. For example, under the Soviets universal literacy rates were achieved, comparatively, the functional literacy rate now has been declining as the quality of education declines. Schools are now overcrowded with Tajikistan having the highest rate of population growth in the post-Soviet space (most families have around four children). This more positive view of the soviets is definitely not something we hear in America. [AP: my personal theory about this as to do with how they are fewer people from the more developed former Soviet countries than there are from the poorer ones, so fewer people get to America to talk about their experiences. Also, all Americans are supposed to hate communism because of power structures, etc, which probably plays a larger role].

Edit on 6/27: The guide at Hissor fortress said that Tajiks liked the Soviets because they had never known a better regime, when talking about Genghis Khan who he said killed thousands of Tajiks.

On the president

            There is hardly any criticism of the president, probably for a number of reasons. 1) he is very harsh on dissent and people are sacred 2) they don’t think the alternatives are any better and any lead will be the same 3) they value stability above all else including personal freedom due to the lingering trauma of the civil war. The government really likes to stress that last reason in all his speeches.

On the civil war

            She got really quiet when talking about this and kept glancing over at our two teachers who are Tajiki nationals (and had lived through the war). It was the most devastating of the wars in the post-soviet space with the most casualties, though estimates are very rough due to the mass migration at the time resulting in serious brain drain on the economy. People never talk about the war anymore and the economy is still recovering. It is still below where was in 1991 when the war broke out. She didn’t get into any specifics either just that sometimes power changes benefit minority groups and other times they don’t plus how there was a treaty signed for power-sharing but that didn’t actually happen. The war is not talked about. [AP: The whole thing reminded me quite strongly of a Fawlty Towers scene where there are these Germans visiting right after the war and everyone is going around saying “don’t talk about the war!” but the first thing they do is ask about the war]

On Schools

The government claims that tri-lingualism (Tajik, Russian, English) is the goal of the school system, but the schools just aren’t high enough quality for that. Students start school at 7 in first grade (or class according to the Tajik word). Depending on the school the ratio of how much each language is taught varies. There are Russian schools, Tajik schools, and even Uzbek schools. Students stick with one group of kids all the way from 7-17 during their 11 years of schooling. Students often marry those in their class. They also don’t get to choose their classes. Rates of functional literacy have been declining since Soviet times when universal literacy was achieved.

On main differences between the US and Tajikistan (collectivism vs. individualism)

            In Tajikistan on a whole people do not feel loyalty to society or the government or the system, as one might in the United States. Instead, Tajiks are fiercely loyal to their families, neighbors, and classmates who they have known for a dozen years. This small circle is often codependent. With one person with a government job actually supporting up to 15 people himself. His official government salary isn’t going to go far enough to support his circle, so they will find any way to skim money off or make more (bribes). This way of skimming money off to the side to support their circles often comes at the expense of development programs like hospitals or education. It is a vicious cycle when the people can’t depend on the government so they depend on their circle, so those in the circle take from the government thus making it in some ways harder to serve in the people. Though they are an awful lot of government dollars being spent on badly-photo shopped posters of the president. [I will do my best to upload some].

            Tajiks also take pride is being like each other. Being similar and homogenous is highly valued, whereas in the United States being a unique individual is highly values, [due to our capitalist economy].

            There is also a large gap between the ideal that they present and will talk about (how things should be) versus the reality and things left unsaid (how things are).

End of notes (just writing this as I remember; there are probably some inaccuracies and definitely generalizations)

In the future, I think I am just going to use the garden of mindfulness format for these reflections/summaries/entries. The format is as follows (credit to Colin Gray and other Commonwealth students for their help developing this version of the model):

·      Rose: highlight of the day

·      Thorn: worst part of the day (lowlight)

·      Bud: something you are looking forward to

·      Bee/Pollen: Some one who helped you and how they helped you

·      Roots: identity you hold or past experience or action that influenced something today and how

·      Soil: something in your environment that had an impact on you today

·      Flower: something that happened today that you are proud of

·      Garden Gnome: funniest moment